Buckles for climber's, linesman's or arborist's belts, harness or saddles and other applications are well known in the art. These types of equipment are typically worn by workers when working at significant heights or in other situations where a fall could be injurious or even fatal. To be practical, a buckle for such equipment must present a combination of ease of fastening and resistance to accidental opening. Buckles of the prior art can be improved to provide adequate protection against accidental opening.
Buckles designed for applications such as climber's, linesman's or arborist's belts, harnesses or saddles and other such applications typically require activation of release mechanisms disposed on opposite sides of the buckle for the buckle to open. Under normal circumstances, this approach to preventing accidental buckle opening is adequate. However, in some applications, for example when an arborist is engaged in trimming a tree, a foreign object may accidentally activate the release mechanism on one side of the buckles of the prior art. In this case, accidental activation of the release mechanism on the opposite side of the buckle may have catastrophic consequences. In some cases, this condition is exacerbated when one portion of a buckle assembly becomes cocked (i.e., experiences side-to-side motion) within the mating buckle portion. This may happen when a foreign object, for example a tree branch, presses against the buckle as a wearer pursues his or her activity while wearing a belt, harness, saddle, fall arrester, or the like.
What is required, therefore, is a device that minimizes or prevents accidental opening of the buckle, particularly when the buckle is subjected to stresses which could cock one buckle component with respect to another buckle component.